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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25562794">Raincheck</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/cherrysprite/pseuds/cherrysprite'>cherrysprite</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Quarantine Fics [27]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Teen Wolf (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Complicated Relationships, First Kiss, Good Theo Raeken, Hurt Theo Raeken, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, Kidnapped Theo Raeken, Kidnapping, M/M, Post-Canon, Pre-Relationship, Protective Liam Dunbar, not graphic</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 12:29:38</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>5,990</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25562794</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/cherrysprite/pseuds/cherrysprite</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Theo goes missing for a total of forty-six hours, and Liam doesn't know what to do.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Liam Dunbar/Theo Raeken</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Quarantine Fics [27]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1691383</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>232</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Raincheck</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Alternate title: "We Weren't Friends"</p><p>TW for minor, undetailed descriptions of torture and blood; it's not from Theo's POV so it's not graphic or shown happening.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <em>
    <span>The cool wind whips through Liam’s hair as he walks through the trees in the Preserve, stepping on branches that crack under tired feet as he goes. The smell of blood and fear still lays thick in the air, but he tries not to notice it as he looks around. He’s looking for a clearing in the trees, and as he gets closer, the smell gets stronger.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“Hello?” Liam says into the night, the moon having risen hours before. He pulls his jacket tighter around himself by the hands in his pockets, both the cold of the night and the chill of anxiety setting in when he gets nothing in response. “Hey…”</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>In the clearing, at least ten hunters lay unconscious or injured on the ground, but that’s not what Liam’s worried about. His eyebrows draw together and his voice grows stronger. “Hello?” He demands, his footsteps becoming quicker. He looks around almost frantically now, his vision blurring in the darkness as he whirls his head around in every direction he can, trying to look at everything at once. His heart starts to pound.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>One of the injured hunters on the ground reaches out to grab at Liam’s ankle for support, but he kicks his hand away sharply and keeps walking. </span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“Come on, no,” He whispers to himself, but his words are the only thing quiet about him. His heartbeat is so loud and strong in his chest that he can hear it along with the blood rushing in his ears, hear the branches under his feet, the phantom cries of the wounded and dead-</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Where is he? Where is he, where is he, where-</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Shh,” Liam hears over the sound of his own racing heart. Suddenly, he’s not in the Preserve anymore. When he jolts awake and opens his eyes, his elbow hits a pillow and he sees nothing but the darkness of his bedroom and his mother’s concerned eyes over him. Her hand runs soothingly over his forehead, brushing the sweat and hair off his face for him while he sleeps.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“What…” Liam murmurs, his voice thick with sleep, but she just shakes her head. “What did I-”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Just a nightmare,” Jenna says soothingly, taking her hand off to rub his shoulder instead. As he looks at the slightly pained smile on her face, everything starts to come back to him in bits and pieces. He vaguely remembers coming home and not being able to breathe as soon as he stepped foot in his room, remembers not being able to tell his mother what happened through the shaking breaths and near-blackouts, remembers her gently urging him to go to sleep when he became too exhausted. She stayed right there with him on the couch across the room, possibly sleeping, considering the tired look in her eyes. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Liam nods, starting to understand. She doesn’t ask what the nightmare was about, and Liam’s glad - for a second, he can’t remember. “‘M okay,” He mutters. Jenna looks at him for a second longer to make sure he’s really telling the truth, but the look on his face must be satisfying enough, since she gives a small, concerned smile and a nod before going back to the couch.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The blissful ignorance doesn’t last long. Liam turns his face back into his pillow and breathes deeply, planning on going right back to sleep, but the few seconds of lucid thought he has left don’t spare him. It occurs to him just before he drops off that if everything that happened with his mom when he came home was real, what happened back in the Preserve is, too. It puts a sick feeling back in his stomach that he’s only able to shake in his sleep. As soon as he wakes up the next morning, he’ll feel it again.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>+++</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Deaton’s veterinary office has become the primary pack gathering location for times like these, so while the other members of the pack gather around and lean on the exam table and talk, Liam sits in one of the chairs off to the side and catches little bits of conversation. His brain doesn’t pick up on nearly any of them. Sometimes, he’ll get the first or last syllables of a word or the beginning of a sentence, but he never gets the full picture. He’s not sure if he’s doing that on purpose or if he really just </span>
  <em>
    <span>can’t</span>
  </em>
  <span> focus. His brain has been fuzzy since the night before.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He sits off to the side and picks at his human fingernails and the skin around them, staring at them instead of anything else. Everything is too overwhelming right now, too loud. It’s easier this way, to just let their voices fade into the background while he devotes his focus to the tiny piece of skin tearing off the side of his index finger and shallow breaths.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Theo has been missing for thirteen hours.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Scott has been here with Deaton and some of the others for hours, but none of them seem to be as exhausted as Liam is. When he’d come in a few hours ago, he walked in almost unnoticed if not for the jingle of the bell above the door. Silently, Liam had taken one of the seats in the exam room, started picking at his fingers, and has been like that ever since. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>With each breath he takes, he smells a number of things. Some of the pack haven’t showered since the night before, so he can still get hints of other peoples’ blood coming off of them. Other times, he’ll breathe in and catch their own scents or chemosignals, sour with worry and salty with sweat. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Every</span>
  </em>
  <span> time, he’ll breathe in and the first thing he smells is a certain kind of cheap laundry detergent and the smell of dirt and leaves. It’s easy to smell right away since Theo’s shirt is right there on him, the one he accidentally left behind the one time he came to Liam’s house. There’s a bullethole in the shoulder from the first time he was shot by a hunter and it’s stained by his blood, but it’s washed, and not enough to erase his natural scent entirely. Whenever Liam breathes and smells it, his chest positively </span>
  <em>
    <span>aches</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It’s still the only thing keeping him above the surface, so he’s not going to take it off.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>In order to keep himself from falling apart, which he’s been doing a good job of so far, Liam stops focusing so much on the smell of Theo’s stolen shirt and puts himself back in his current setting. Just a few feet away, his pack is still talking, and he knows he should be listening for anything he can.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Among the quiet murmurs, Liam hears the sharp quality that comes to Stiles’s voice when he’s thinking. “And we’re </span>
  <em>
    <span>sure</span>
  </em>
  <span> he didn’t just take off?” He says like it’s a topic that’s already been debated, but the others take it seriously anyway. Liam swallows hard, wanting to speak up and say that he wouldn’t do that. Theo wouldn’t have just left without a word.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Would he? After all that had happened? </span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I mean, I don’t know,” Scott admits. “I don’t think he would, but it’s not impossible.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I wouldn’t put it past him,” Malia mutters under her breath, but Liam knows she means for everyone to hear it anyway. “He’s tried to go before.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I somehow don’t think so,” A much surer voice interrupts, and the pack, including Liam, looks up to see Parrish standing there. Between his large thumb and index finger is a key hanging from a dice keychain, and Liam’s breath leaves him almost as soon as it comes. “I found his truck parked in the Preserve.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Liam watches with wide eyes and a lip pulled between his teeth as Scott and Stiles both look at each other, having one of those silent conversations nobody else seems to understand. Scott looks at him curiously, Stiles raises an eyebrow, and they somehow come to a conclusion with a single nod. Stiles motions for Parrish to toss him the keys, and Liam’s almost mad when Stiles predictably doesn’t catch them the first time they land in his palm.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“We’ll check it out,” Scott says as they head towards the back door, neither of them sparing a glance Liam’s way. Liam watches them go, swallows back the lump in his throat, and does the only thing he can do. He waits.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>+++</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The Preserve looks so much different in the daytime. Thin clouds cover the sun, so when Liam gets there, the sky is a light, bright shade of grey that hurts his eyes. In his hand is the dice keychain he’d more thrown at Theo than given to him a few months back as he searches around for Theo’s truck. He’d still kept it, even if it was meant as a petty attack.</span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>
    <br/>
  </span>
  <span>Liam had grown tired of sitting in one place and had to move, so when Scott and Stiles came back, he’d wordlessly taken the key and tried to follow the scent of where they’d headed. He sees Theo’s truck in the distance and walks forward, ignoring the sharp chill and heavy feeling of nausea that runs through him when he thinks about what he’s doing.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It feels unreal as he opens the passenger-side door with the key and steps inside. He settles into the beaten-up beige leather seat, shuts the door, and even goes as far as to put his seatbelt on. He stares straight ahead out of the windshield and tries to breathe. </span>
  <em>
    <span>The Preserve looks so much different in the daytime.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>At night, the tall, dead trees are nothing more than looming shadows if not for the lingering headlights of Theo’s truck, which he keeps on longer than he needs to as they both sit there together. They’d pulled into the small clearing, hidden enough that they wouldn’t be attacked too quickly, but Liam doesn’t get out of the truck right away. Instead, he stalls in the front seat, not daring to look at Theo.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>The chimera is smart, trained; Liam knows he can sense the distress coming off of him. However, instead of making some rude remark and rushing him along like Liam expects him to, Theo just looks at him for a second with a thoughtful expression on his face. </span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Instead of a “come on” or “what’s your problem,” Theo actually asks him in a way that doesn’t trigger his fight-or-flight response. “What’s wrong?” He asks, his voice sounding genuinely curious and even a little concerned. </span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Liam doesn’t get to hear that tone much. He’s only heard it twice before - in the truck after almost killing Nolan and in the truck after Liam asked for a ride home from the fight at the hospital - which makes it all the more special. It’s the “truck voice.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Maybe it’s the rarity of it, or maybe he’s really just that tired, but Liam answers honestly for once. “I just…” He breathes, swallowing once and shutting his eyes. When he opens them again, Theo’s still looking at him. “I don’t want to get hurt.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>It sounds pathetic and he knows it. He’s been shot, bitten, poisoned, taken prisoner, and so much more, but he’s being honest. It’s a Sunday night right now, and Liam slept in that morning and ate breakfast with his parents while it was still a normal day. This wasn’t supposed to happen. He’s supposed to be at home where his parents know he’s not dead, and he’ll go to lacrosse practice on Monday morning. He’s tired. He’s so tired. And he’s pathetic.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>So when Theo replies and it isn’t an incredulous laugh or an insult, Liam’s surprised. He’s even more shocked, right to his core, when Theo just shakes his head and looks at him quietly. Just like how he barely ever gets to hear Theo talk quietly, he sees this much less.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>As though he’s dared Theo to surprise him more, Theo’s fingertips brush his jaw and Liam feels his heart jump into his throat. </span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“I won’t let them,” Theo says softly, and Liam barely has a chance to breathe before Theo is moving in and kissing him.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>When their lips meet, Liam’s mind both goes blank and explodes all at once, if it’s possible. His body tenses up for just a split second before he feels himself melting into Theo’s kiss like it’s the most natural thing in the world. On some level, it is. He’s only ever kissed Hayden before, and he’s never let himself think about kissing Theo for more than a few seconds at a time, so now that it’s happening, he feels like everything else has faded away. Theo’s fingers twitch on the side of his face, he breathes in through his nose, and if Liam were standing, he knows he’d collapse. Every little movement, sound, vibration Theo makes sends Liam spiraling, so much that he’s dizzy when Theo breaks away to breathe.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>He half expects Theo to take off, but he doesn’t. He’s grateful for it - he feels so lightheaded he can barely string words together, much less deal with a runaway. </span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“Why-” Liam breathes, his lips tingling and eyes wide. He still feels kind of like he’s floating, like the blissful feeling of waking up on a sunny morning. “We…” He swallows. “We should talk about this.” He’s shocked that the first words he manages to get to stick together coherently are something so responsible, but he’s so confused that he can’t ask for much more.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>Theo opens his mouth, but the buzz of his phone on the dashboard interrupts him. He grabs it and shows it to him after reading it - “We’re going,” a message from Scott, who’s on the other side of the Preserve waiting to make an entrance.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>“Raincheck,” Theo mutters, though his voice is rougher from the kiss and still has traces of the quietness of before. “Duty calls.”</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>
    <span>On the way in to meet Scott, their fingers brush together as they walk next to each other. There’s the unspoken promise of “after we get out of here” when they look at each other right before walking into action.</span>
  </em>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Liam opens his eyes, not having realized he’d shut them to begin with, and sighs deeply. He’s always been an optimist, but life is cruel, and Liam’s losing faith in it by the minute. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He doesn’t know what Theo would’ve said, but that’s not even the point. The sharp, stinging point is that Liam really isn’t sure if he ever </span>
  <em>
    <span>will</span>
  </em>
  <span>. He could go the rest of his life without knowing what Theo would have said if he didn’t go missing. He just needs to know that he’s still </span>
  <em>
    <span>there</span>
  </em>
  <span> and </span>
  <em>
    <span>able</span>
  </em>
  <span> to tell him if he wants to, but he </span>
  <em>
    <span>doesn’t</span>
  </em>
  <span> know that. All he knows is that according to the watch on his wrist, he’s been gone for fourteen hours and about thirty minutes, and that’s too fucking long.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It’s too fucking long when the pack still has no idea what they’re going to to, and it’s too fucking long for the heart in Liam’s chest slowly breaking.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Liam takes a deep, shuddering breath, closes his eyes, and squares his shoulders. Even if he’s worse off about this than anyone else, he still needs to appear strong. He gets out of the truck and is about to shut the door behind him when he catches a glimpse of something shoved under the driver’s seat.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>When he pulls it out, his stomach drops. It’s an old, caseless pillow, and it makes Liam’s blood run cold once again. If Theo’s been living in his truck, there’s really no way he just ran. He would’ve taken what little he has with him, first.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Liam swallows back the bile rising in his throat, drops the pillow on Theo’s seat, and leaves.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>+++</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>His plan of appearing strong is growing weaker by hour forty-one. Parrish has said numerous times by now, not that Liam didn’t already know, that the first forty-eight hours can be the most important in any investigation. After those forty-eight hours pass, they can expect a decrease in the chance to find him, and Liam tries not to think about that.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The thought still rattles around in his head anyway, Parrish’s reminders bouncing off the walls of his skull and echoing. It’s all he can do not to burst out in tears in the middle of Deaton’s office, where they’re all gathered for the second day in a row. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Liam’s in his same spot, tuning everything out, not that there’s a lot to listen to, anyway. At some point, this continued gathering became more out of guilt and worry than actual planning. As far as he can tell, the pack is still searching for clues and leads, but there will be long stretches of silence that no one knows how to fill, and they get more frequent as hours pass. Nobody knows what to do, so some of them go Liam’s route and have to play the waiting game until somebody does.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The vet’s office is mostly quiet save for Stiles and Lydia talking softly to each other when Malia and Kira come through the back door. They’d gone out to the Preserve to try and find anything they could, and considering the look on Malia’s face, they have. Sure enough, she sets a phone down on the metal exam table with a small “</span>
  <em>
    <span>clang</span>
  </em>
  <span>” and looks around at everyone else. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>A few of them, not including Liam, move to see the new piece she’s brought. “It’s a phone, looks like a burner,” Kira says. “There’s only one number in it, and one message. It looks like some kind of code, or at least nothing English.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Parrish picks up the phone and examines it, and Liam hears his sharp intake of breath. “This is the same brand of burner phone that Gabe had on him when he died,” He says, and the entire atmosphere of the room shifts to something more nervous. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>They hadn’t considered that yet. They may have been fighting hunters two nights ago when Theo went missing, but as far as they could tell at that point, Monroe had nothing to do with it.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You think she might’ve- what, taken him?” Scott asks, looking from Parrish to Stiles. “What motive would she have for that?</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Well,” Stiles considers, always being the first to point out Theo’s mistakes. Over on the other side of the room, Liam bites the inside of his cheek. “Theo was pretty much the prime example of everything Monroe aimed to destroy. He wasn’t even peaceful like you. He was a killer.” Liam wants to tell him to stop using the word </span>
  <em>
    <span>‘was</span>
  </em>
  <span>,’ but he can’t get the words out. Luckily, Mason does it for him.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Don’t say </span>
  <em>
    <span>‘was</span>
  </em>
  <span>,’” He says under his breath, but Stiles ignores him.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“He was also a huge part of her losing and leaving Beacon Hills. All I’m saying is that I would understand why she’d want to take him. Even if she’s not trying to lure us out, since, let’s face it, none of us really like him, she could just want him to torture for fun.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>At the word “</span>
  <em>
    <span>torture</span>
  </em>
  <span>,” Liam lets out an involunatary squeak, making the rest of his pack turn their heads to look at him in surprise, just then remembering that he’s there. He’s suddenly thrust even further into the reality of the situation, and he can’t handle it. Not only is Theo missing, something is </span>
  <em>
    <span>happening</span>
  </em>
  <span> to him wherever he is, something Liam can’t control or stop. He could be </span>
  <em>
    <span>sick</span>
  </em>
  <span>, or </span>
  <em>
    <span>hurt</span>
  </em>
  <span>, or-or…</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Lydia crosses the room slowly and carefully, a sympathetic expression on her face. She kneels down in front of the chair so that she can look into his eyes, but Liam can’t bear it for more than a few seconds. He stares at the floor instead and tries not to jump out of his skin when she rests a hand on his shoulder in a way that’s supposed to be comforting.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’m sorry,” She says softly, her thumb rubbing circles in the fabric on his shoulder. “I know he’s your friend.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Liam bites his lip and feels his eyes pricking with tears trying to get out, but instead of letting them fall, he shakes his head. He doesn’t know why he says it, but the word “</span>
  <em>
    <span>friends</span>
  </em>
  <span>” just sounds wrong and doesn’t cut it at all. They went from punching each other in the face every other day to promising protection and kissing in the dark with no in-between. They were never just </span>
  <em>
    <span>friends</span>
  </em>
  <span>. “</span>
  <em>
    <span>Friends</span>
  </em>
  <span>” is a pathetic word to say, the coward’s way out, and now that Theo could be </span>
  <em>
    <span>dead</span>
  </em>
  <span>, he just can’t.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“We weren’t friends,” He says, his voice rough and thick from disuse. From his peripheral vision, he sees Lydia and the rest of the packs’ confusion. “I don’t know what we were, but we weren’t-” He cuts off, fighting against the lump in his throat. “We weren’t friends.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He can tell the exact moment when Lydia gets it before anyone else, just as she always does. Her face falls from confused to something so much sadder and her hand grips Liam’s shoulder more firmly. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“We’re going to find him,” She whispers, but he knows that’s not something she can promise.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>+++</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>When destroying his human fingernails don’t cut it anymore, Liam finds himself with the claw of his index finger out and picking at the skin on his thumb. It cuts through a lot easier with the sharp tip of the claw, so instead of watching the cracked skin peel off and regenerate, he watches deeper scratches bleed and heal within seconds. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He feels fucking </span>
  <em>
    <span>useless</span>
  </em>
  <span>. The pack has been trying to crack the coded message for hours now, and Liam has nothing to contribute. He doesn’t have Lydia’s genius-level IQ or Stiles’s psychological knowledge. He doesn’t have Theo’s experienced intelligence to help. All Liam has is desperation, and he hates himself for it. If Theo were there and </span>
  <em>
    <span>Liam</span>
  </em>
  <span> was the one missing, he would’ve been able to find him by now. He’d have both the intelligence </span>
  <em>
    <span>and</span>
  </em>
  <span> the desperation, and knowing Theo, that would be a powerful mix that Monroe would never be able to beat.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“You’re going to hurt yourself if you keep doing that,” Mason’s soft voice says next to him. For a minute, Liam comes back to reality. Somewhere between hour forty-one and hour forty-six, which they’re on now, someone, possibly Mason or Lydia, had guided him into the waiting room so that he wouldn’t have to listen anymore. He remembers that when he notices the little bits of blood on the floor from where he’s begun to tear his hands apart just because he’s itching to move. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Mason puts his hand over Liam’s so that he has to stop, and Liam’s about to pull them away and shoot something back, but the door to Deaton’s office flies open and hits the wall. Lydia’s standing there, looking almost breathless and with bright eyes. “The cave,” She breathes, looking between Mason and Liam quickly. “We got the code, Monroe’s somewhere in the caves up in Beacon Heights.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Before she even says “we have to go,” Liam is up out of his seat and moving faster than he has in days to get to someone’s car. He hops into Mason’s, and they take off.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>+++</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It all happens in a blur.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>They reach the caves in only about fifteen minutes of speeding, push past the trees blocking the main entrance, and gain access quickly. Malia and Kira take the hunters guarding the front so that Scott, Parrish, Lydia, and Liam can get right into the action inside. They run through the large, dark tunnels of the cave until they find the one with the heartbeats, and after that, Liam’s mind effectively goes blank. He barely notices the gunshots that rain on him and the others when they storm in, or the screaming and demanding that Monroe herself is doing over all the other noise that Liam’s tuning out. He barely notices that he’s been shot in the shoulder and the leg, keeping his pace and running. The only thing he has his mind on is the scent of Theo’s blood above everyone else’s and the small but </span>
  <em>
    <span>still-there</span>
  </em>
  <span> beat of his heart.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Everything seems to come to a screeching halt all at once. In the same moment that Parrish pulls a gun on Monroe while Scott holds his claws over her throat threateningly, he finally sees Theo in all of his beaten-up, broken glory. He’s bound to a metal fence with wolfsbane vines that cut into his wrists, legs, ankles, and neck, and his shirt is covered in his own blood. There are still open gashes on his face and torso that are struggling to heal from the wolfsbane, and it makes Liam see red.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He ignores the burning in his own hands as he rushes to tear and untangle the vines from Theo’s body, and as soon as the ones binding his wrists come off, he goes down. Liam catches him before he can fall right down to the rocky floor, lowering him as quickly yet softly as he can so his head is in his lap. His heart beats a mile a minute while Theo’s heartbeat is weak and slow.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It takes Liam a minute to realize that he has Theo here and that he’s still alive, and it doesn’t settle in fully until much, much later, but when Theo’s eyelids flutter, Liam chokes out a sob of pure relief. He’s injured and critical, but he’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>alive</span>
  </em>
  <span>, and he thinks Theo might even be kind of awake.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>As soon as all of the vines are completely pulled away and tossed to the side, Liam focuses his attention on Theo’s face, which is already starting to heal now that the poison is gone. “Oh, God, you’re okay, you’re </span>
  <em>
    <span>okay</span>
  </em>
  <span>,” Liam cries, a watery smile on his face as he looks down at Theo. His head rests heavily on Liam’s thigh and his eyes are unfocused and bleary, but he’s still breathing through parted lips. A gash on one of his cheekbones that looks like it came from a knife starts to scar up and heal over, and Liam runs both his thumbs over each of his cheekbones just because he </span>
  <em>
    <span>can</span>
  </em>
  <span>. He can’t </span>
  <em>
    <span>stop</span>
  </em>
  <span> touching him, needing to feel that he’s really there under his hands, in all the smooth and rough parts of his skin and the crust in his once-soft hair. He runs his thumbs over his cheekbones again and moves down to his jaw, then brushes his hair off his forehead. He doesn’t even blink at the feeling of dried blood in it, just needing to get it off his sweaty face for him.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Theo can open his eyes long enough for Liam to know that the chimera at least somewhat understands what’s happening, but they keep slipping shut like he’s fading in and out of consciousness. “You’re okay, you’re gonna be okay,” Liam whispers, ignoring the sound of one more gunshot across the room that makes Theo’s tired body flinch. “Just stay awake for me, a-alright? If you stay awake for me now, you can have the best nap of your life a little later, okay? I promise, it’s gonna feel so good, but you’ve gotta stay awake. You can take that nap, and then we can talk about what we were supposed to, remember?” He asks, even though he knows Theo won’t answer. “We can do all that, but that’s only if you stay awake.” Theo’s fighting to keep his eyes open for him, and he strokes the side of his face in encouragement. He can hear his words, </span>
  <em>
    <span>understand</span>
  </em>
  <span> them, and that makes a new rush of tears flood down Liam’s face. “Yeah, see? You can do it. You’re okay.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Liam?” Scott says above him, and for the first time, Liam looks away from Theo. It’s then that he notices that the cave has gone quiet; the gunshots have ceased, and there’s only the echo of heartbeats and soft speaking. Liam wants to ask what happened while he was distracted, but the look on Scott’s face conveys it silently - </span>
  <em>
    <span>“It’s been taken care of.”</span>
  </em>
  <span> “We can go,” He says.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It takes Liam a second to nod and get to his feet, and he gathers Theo up in his arms when he does. He’s heavy and barely conscious, so it’s an awkward fit, but Liam doesn’t mind. Not at all.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>+++</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Liam’s muscles are sore and his eyelids are heavy, but he’s not going to sleep. Against the advice of his pack and Melissa, who helped extract the bullets Liam hadn’t noticed, he thinks it’s much more important to stay awake in Scott’s guest room with Theo. He’s been sleeping for hours on the twin-size bed, and he’ll probably be asleep longer, but that doesn’t matter. Liam doesn’t want Theo to wake up after all of that alone.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>So he watches Theo sleep, his face a lot more peaceful than it was when he’d first found him. The wounds on his face, torso, and limbs have healed up nicely thanks to Melissa’s herb concoction and speedy work, and as for the blood, Liam’s done his part in that. He’s already wiped as much of the blood, sweat, and dirt off of Theo’s face and arms with a damp cloth, and done the best he could for his hair, which he combed through gently and brushed off his face in his sleep. As for the rest of his body, which is bandaged and naked except for his underwear under the blankets, he’ll need a shower, but he’s a lot better off than he was.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Tomorrow, Liam will still be awake like this for him. Maybe he’ll sneak in a nap when Theo will inevitably need one, but otherwise, he’s planning on taking care of him already. He’s worked some water through Theo’s lips already, and he already knows that he’s going to be insufferable when it comes to getting Theo to eat - he must be starving. After that, he’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>definitely</span>
  </em>
  <span> going to force Theo to live with him. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>He just wants Theo to be happy again now that he’s safe, even happier than he was to begin with. After the last fifty-two hours, Liam can’t imagine things going back to “normal.” There is no more “</span>
  <em>
    <span>normal</span>
  </em>
  <span>.” Too many things have changed, and they’re going to have to adjust to it the best they can. He’s more than willing to do that if Theo is.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>It’s a mix of Liam’s loud thinking and his need to keep stroking Theo’s hair that wakes him up. Liam smiles as Theo’s eyelids flutter, opening and closing a few times before the rest of his body gets the memo to wake up. His body under the blanket shifts and he turns his head to see what’s touching him. When their eyes meet, Theo doesn’t jerk away like he might’ve before. Instead, he blinks himself into getting used to the darkness of the room and smacks his mouth a little. “Oh...hi,” He croaks, his voice rough from sleep, and Liam feels his heart soar. He tamps down on it before he can get too excited and throw Theo off.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Hey,” Liam says softly. Since Theo isn’t resisting, he keeps stroking Theo’s soft hair, his fingers brushing along his hairline gently. He doesn’t want this spell to break, and seemingly neither does Theo, but he’s still clearly trying to figure out where he is. “You’ve been out awhile. Almost six hours, now. We’re at Scott’s,” Liam explains quietly, trying to make it a little easier for him. Theo blinks, a small crease between his eyebrows popping up as he thinks about that. “You should probably sleep more, actually. You need it.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Mmh, I-” Theo murmurs, still getting used to his body again. “I got- </span>
  <em>
    <span>fuck…</span>
  </em>
  <span>”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Yeah,” Liam confirms, a slight bit of laughter in his voice. “You had me scared.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Theo’s eyes close again and Liam can see the beginning of his trademark smirk. “</span>
  <em>
    <span>‘Scared</span>
  </em>
  <span>?’” He asks, almost scoffs, but Liam just nods.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“</span>
  <em>
    <span>Yeah</span>
  </em>
  <span>,” He breathes. Theo’s smirk fades when he realizes how serious he is, and he opens his eyes. Liam isn’t sure how to take what he sees there, so he changes the subject. “How are you feeling?”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“Fine,” Theo says, bringing both of his bare arms out from under the covers. He looks at them as scrutinizingly as he can, both of them seeing that the cuts Monroe inflicted are gone. Only the red rings around his wrists remain where he was bound, but Liam’s confident they’ll fade by morning. “Just sore.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I’ll bet,” Liam says. He watches as Theo stretches his hands and arms out, wiggling his fingers and testing all their joints. He wonders how many times Theo has done this before, alone in the back of his truck. “So,” Liam begins, not exactly sure where he’s going from there. “The pack kind of...knows…”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Theo turns his head to look at him, some of his hair falling against the pillow. Liam takes his hand away and rests it against the mattress. “‘The pack </span>
  <em>
    <span>knows…</span>
  </em>
  <span>?’” He asks, even though Liam’s pretty sure he doesn’t need to clarify for him.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“About us,” He says anyway. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Theo smirks again, but he looks too tired to really be smug. “What </span>
  <em>
    <span>about</span>
  </em>
  <span> us?” He asks teasingly, and even though neither of them can really see it in the dark, Liam feels himself blush. He looks down at his hand on the mattress and shrugs.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“I...don’t know,” He admits, giving a breathless laugh that Theo returns. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>One of Theo’s hands cover his own, and the other reaches to tilt Liam’s head back up so he can kiss him. Theo’s lips are dry and cracked from dehydration, and his mouth still tastes like blood, but Liam still sighs into it and lets his muscles go lax. He’s been waiting for this, so nothing’s going to stop him from taking it. Their lips slot together perfectly and Liam shuts his eyes to the feeling.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>The first time Theo kissed him, he didn’t smile. He’d looked at Liam in a way he’d never seen before, but he didn’t smile. The second time, however, Theo does. He pulls away with his hand still on Liam’s jaw, and as soon as Liam opens his eyes, he’s met with one of those rare, soft smiles that makes him want to melt. His eyes are shiny, his face is illuminated only by the lamp in the corner of the room, and he’s </span>
  <em>
    <span>smiling</span>
  </em>
  <span>.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>“We’ll know.” It takes Liam a second to understand what he’s talking about through his daze, but when he gets it, he nods against Theo’s forehead. “We’ll know. We’ll talk about it, but I...I feel like I could sleep another twelve hours,” Theo admits, sounding disappointed. “We’ll have to take another raincheck.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Liam nods, but bites his lip with worry. “Yeah,” He breathes. “But don’t...just don’t disappear into the night again, okay?” He asks, only a little jokingly. “Last time you said that to me, I didn’t see you for two days.”</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Theo leans up to kiss him, but Liam can tell it takes a lot of his energy, so they keep it short. He falls back onto the bed and smiles up at Liam tiredly, already starting to fade back into sleep. “I’ll do my best,” He murmurs, settling back against the pillow. Liam takes his word for it.</span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Theo’s hand is still resting over Liam’s, so he doesn’t move it. He just waits until Theo drifts off, starting to finally do the same himself. </span>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <span>Sometime in the night, their fingers tangle together, and they keep them that way when they walk downstairs the next morning for breakfast.</span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Bonus:<br/>"...You wearin' my shirt?"<br/>"Yeah. For the last two days."<br/>"You stink."<br/>"Yeah, well, you're not much better!"</p><p>----</p><p>Thank you for reading!!</p><p>I kinda broke my brain trying to calculate how many hours Theo was actually gone for the sake of Liam's internal angst monloguing and I'm STILL pretty sure I got it wrong, but we can just ignore that. I'm not good at math and apparently it goes as far as not being able to apply logic to basic counting LMAO.</p><p>Anyways, I really liked writing this one :) I probably should've seen it coming sooner that after almost 80 Teen Wolf fics I was going to end up writing about kidnapping at some point, skjhjds. Usually I'm not into the whole big-angst thing but I really wanted a scene with Liam just cradling Theo's face in his hands and brushing his hair back and yeah :,) Here we have it!</p><p>Let me know what you think in the comments! I'm working on my angst skills so I'd love to hear your thoughts :))<br/>- Emma (grenadinepeach on tumblr)</p></blockquote></div></div>
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